Colorful Memories
by Maisie Malfoy
Summary: A simple question leads to an anecdote about the Weasleys, a hot summer day, and a few bottles of Muggle hair dye. Snippets of Harry/Ginny.


**This was inspired by my thinking a little more than I should about the Weasleys all having red hair.**

 **These are not characters I usually write, so please bear with me.**

 **This is set after Hogwarts, but before the marriage of Harry and Ginny.**

* * *

Harry kept noticing Ginny seemed dramatically opposed to the Muggles who went about with funny colors in their hair. One day, he decided to ask her why.

"Ginny, I've been noticing how you don't seem to like people dyeing their hair." Harry said.

"And?" she snapped. Mostly, she wasn't asked about it.

"I just thought maybe there was a reason."

Harry thought Ginny might ignore him, or say it was nothing important. He definitely had no idea she was going to tell him a story.

* * *

It was the year before Ron started at Hogwarts, in the heat of July's end. He was sick of all the Weasleys having red hair. Ron was sometimes allowed to borrow Arthur's wand for simple spells, but he was away at work.

Luckily, he kept a few bottles of Muggle hair dye among other Muggle items.

Of course, Ron didn't know if it was going to work. He had to try it out. Unfortunately, the only other Weasley in sight was Ginny.

"Please can I try something on you?' Ron asked.

"Will it hurt?" Ginny asked. She didn't look up from her book, _How to Put Nail Polish on a Troll._

"Nope. Come on, we've got to do this before Mum sees us." Ron hid the hair dye in his pocket.

"Is it going to get us in trouble?"

"Of course it won't. Well, it won't get _you_ in trouble."

At this, Ginny shut the book and followed Ron outside.

Now, being a wizard in a whole family of wizards, Ron had no idea how to apply the dye. He asked Ginny if _she_ did.

"How would I know?"

Ron pulled one of the bottles out of his pocket. Purple. That would have to do, if he wanted to use the green on Percy and the others. And he poured a glop of purple hair dye onto Ginny's head.

That had to work, didn't it? He kept at it until her whole head of hair was purple.

"Like it?" Ron asked. He showed Ginny her reflection in the window.

"IT'S PURPLE!" she screamed.

"Don't you like it?"

"NO! No...yes, I like it." Ginny admitted. "This comes out, right?"

"It should. It said it does." Ron said. "Want to put some on Percy?"

"Of course!" Now Ginny was excited about Ron's little plan.

* * *

"So all this is because he dyed your hair purple?" asked Harry.

"No," Ginny sounded slightly amused now. "There was more."

"What kind of more?" Harry asked.

"Let me finish."

* * *

Percy didn't like his new look at all. "Why would you do this to me?" he demanded.

"Oh, lighten up, Perce." Ron said. "Green suits you better."

"I like the green." Ginny said. "I wish mine was green."

"You can't put green on top of purple. It'll look awful." said Ron.

"Worse than your boring old hair?" Ginny asked. Ron hadn't dyed his. Yet. Arthur didn't have blue.

"Maybe not." said Ron.

Of course Fred and George wanted to dye theirs too, and so did Bill. Charlie wasn't in at first.

"You're sure this comes out." Charlie had said about 33,747,022 times, before Ron just got exasperated and dyed him anyway.

The whole room was soon filled with seven Weasleys with green-or in Ginny's case purple-hair. Just when Ron had succesfully applied enough green dye to his hair, Molly walked in.

"What is going on here?" she demanded. "Fred? George? What did you do?"

"We didn't do this one, dear mother." said Fred, as he and George each kissed one of their mother's cheeks.

"Are they lying to me?"

"No. It was Ron. And Ginny helped." said Percy. It figured it would be Percy who ratted them out.

Molly turned to her two youngest. "You two did this?'

"No. Just Ron."

"Ginny!" Ron said. "You helped, and you know you did!"

The seven Weasleys found themselves standing in a line so their mother could charm their hair back to its correct shade. Some were pleased, a few grumbled, but no one complained more than Ron. "Mum, I liked my hair when it was green!"

"There are plenty of things I like but can't have, Ronald Bilius. Now stop your complaining!"

He only stopped his complaining when his mother failed to remove the purple dye from Ginny's hair.

"Haha! Bet it'll be purple forever!" Ron said, laughing.

"It won't really be purple forever, will it?" Ginny asked, her eyes welling up.

"Of course not, Ginny dear." Molly reassured her.

But after several charms, three scrubs, and plenty of Ginny's hair being forcibly removed from her scalp, her hair was purple as ever. "What do they _put_ in this Muggle hair dye?" Molly found herself wondering aloud more than a few times. While that was going on, Arthur came home from work and began walking through the yard with a hammer.

After it dawned on her where the dye came from, the children hid behind the largest outdoor shrub to watch their father's futile attempts to avert the wrath of Molly Weasley.

* * *

"But it came out, didn't it?" Harry asked. "It was only Muggle."

"That's the very problem." Ginny said. "I guess Dad put a charm or something on that bottle, but not the other."

"How do you know that?"

"It _was_ purple forever. Mum taught me a different charm so it looks red. But if I don't reapply it often enough," She paused to try and show Harry her roots. "it grows in purple. It always has. I never forgave Ron."

Harry smiled at that; it was just such a Ron thing to do. He told her, "Whether your hair is red, purple, or some weird flesh-tone, I would still love you."

* * *

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